Fallujans dread returning to 'cursed city'

Amriyat al fallujah (Iraq) - "I was so scared, it was chaos, I miscarried. I was expecting twins. I lost my twins... I had gone to hospital because I had no food," she said, holding one of her nine other children.

 When her five-year-old son asked her to kill him because he was too hungry, Umm Issam knew she would never come back to Fallujah if she was able to leave.
Iraqi forces on Sunday wrapped up operations in Fallujah and declared the area free of militants from the Daesh group after a month-long operation.
The government said the destruction caused by the fighting was limited and vowed to do its utmost to allow the tens of thousands of displaced civilians to return to their homes.
After more than two years under the tyrannic rule of Daesh and months of a siege that starved the population, Umm Issa, 42, said she thought she could never be happy in Fallujah again. "My son asked me to kill him because he was so hungry he couldn't take it anymore... By God that's what he said. He's five," she said, shaking her head. Months earlier, she had a miscarriage in Fallujah hospital when an air strike hit a nearby building and caused panic.
"I was so scared, it was chaos, I miscarried. I was expecting twins. I lost my twins... I had gone to hospital because I had no food," she said, holding one of her nine other children.
Behind her, in one of the ever-expanding displacement camps in Amriyat Al Fallujah, the Norwegian Refugee Council was conducting a delivery of basic goods for new arrivals. The basic package, meant for a family housed in a single tent, consisted of six mattresses, a cooking kit, a camping lamp, a sheet of tarpaulin, an empty water container and brown tape. "It's hot and dusty here, there isn't enough water or food, but we can survive," said Umm Issa.
"I don't want to go back. It has been through so much - the Americans, Al Qaeda, Daesh, starvation... And I don't know what's next but this city is cursed, I'm not going back."
While military operations in the area are all but over, the humanitarian crisis is peaking and the number of displaced is continuing to grow.

• MENA